Your eyes are not playing tricks on you. This is not a hallucination. It’s game time, people! Benedict Cumberbatch covers this season’s issue of the New York Times’ T Style Magazine. The photoshoot is by Karim Sadli, and I swear Benedict looks like he’s 25 years old here. Is it just the hair? Is it airbrushing? Or is he just getting more beautiful year after year? Sigh… my love burns brightly for The Batch. I shall not lie about it, or play it cool. I would tear him up. Anyway, you can read the full NYT piece here, and here are some highlights:

His looks: He says he looks like “Sid from ‘Ice Age’ ” and although he once declared that “I always seem to be cast as slightly wan, ethereal, troubled intellectuals or physically ambivalent bad lovers,” there are numerous websites devoted to the subject of his romantic prowess, e.g., “Benedict Cumberbatch — Fantastic Lover,” a compendium of clips set to Marvin Gaye’s “Let’s Get It On,” that has been viewed more than 490,000 times on YouTube.

His Time Magazine cover: “It’s one of the more bizarre levels of success,” he said. At first he thought it was fake. “Someone sent me a photograph of it and I thought, ‘Some fan has got hold of a photo and done one of those neat apps where they impose your head on something,’ ” he said.

After playing geniuses like Sherlock & Alan Turing, he says: “I am so ready to play a really dumb character.”

People obsessed with Sherlock: “I always make it clear that people who become obsessed with him or the idea of him — he’d destroy you,” Cumberbatch said cheerfully. “He is an absolute bastard.”

Holding up political signs while filming Sherlock: “These are very complex questions and very difficult arguments to be very clear about, so to ask the questions is to stimulate the debate,” he explained. He has not done it since, though, he said, “I felt really strongly about it at the time.”

Why he was in NYC: In New York he was visiting his friend Zachary Quinto, who acted alongside him in “Star Trek,” seeing some movies, going to some museums and trying to keep a low profile. He is currently unattached, and is gearing up for his next batch of work.

He didn’t like how his Star Trek character ended up: “That was a stupid thing to do,” Cumberbatch said, referring to Starfleet Command. “They should have just blown me up.”

Dealing with crowds and his fandom: “If you pick a point far behind them they perceive you as not seeing them, and you’re the obstacle they have to get around.” For a moment, he sounded positively Sherlockian. “There is a way of just shadowing through,” he continued. “The higher the walls, the more dark the windows, the bigger the sunglasses — the more people are going to look. The greatest disguise is learning how to be invisible in plain sight.”

Is this the best Cumberinterview ever? No, it’s not. They didn’t even ask him about all the times he’s nearly died, nor did they ask him about his beloved mother Wanda. NYT FAIL. Still, it’s nice to see him photographed beautifully and on the cover of a fashion-y magazine. Lovely, lovely Batch. One day, sir. One day you will be mine.

@Janeite – I’ll be there for a visit shortly and will bring my reading glasses and a bottle of butterscotch schnapps to keep us warm!! LadyS, could you bring that special lamp you have? You know the one with the shade made from used makeup tissues we found discarded by Benedict’s Sherlock trailer…

The old one started to look too depressing. I mean, I am here mostly for the Cumby and Hiddles posts and that always cheers me up, no need to look like death when discussing those fine English biscuits.
I refrained from changing it to a creepy Batch/Hiddles droolfest picture, I try to maintain the semblance of sanity every now and then.

I like the idea of hot men hiding in plain sight at locations near me. Someone should develop a hiding in plain sight detector app for Google Glass so I can spot them despite their mad hiding in plain sight acting skillz.

Mark Gatiss’s husband played a barrister in S1, Benedict’s then-gf was a secretary in the same run, Moffat’s son has been in it twice (once as the voice of the boy on the phone and once as young Sherlock)… The Beeb is big on family being cast, lol. It’s kind of cute.

“I always seem to be cast as slightly wan, ethereal, troubled intellectuals or physically ambivalent bad lovers”
In which category does his character in Atonement fall into? Nevermind, I’d rather suppress that memory.

I think this is the lighting and a bit of Photoshop. He definitely has crow’s feet and deeper lines around his mouth, although the rest of his face is good for his age.

Actually, these photos are what Cumberbatch looked like when he was in To the Ends of the Earth, the first thing I ever saw him in. While I did not fall in love then, I became a fan – so, Fan of Cumberbatch for 9 years! Still don’t think he’s sexy, though, but his voice is incomparable.

As if you will ever see him looking like this in public. It’s as funny as a McDonald’s commercial where the hamburger meat looks so great,but when you finally meet ( mean see) it in person,it’s thin and flat and the lettuce is old.
This is what he calls “hiding in public.” It is just not him. So don’t expect hot stuff. Because you won’t get it.

Because he is the first and only celeb who ever had photoshop used in a magazine spread? As if. You won’t see anyone look as good in real life as they do in EDITED MAGAZINE PICTURES. He might not have the smoothest skin but he’s verrrry attractive in person.

I think these are mostly the result of some airbrush/photoshop, because unfortunately he isn’t going to suddenly reverse the 15 years he added to his face in just one Los Angeles summer, but they are lovely anyway. It’s nice to see that they didn’t pose him with some slimy smirk.

I liked the interview-for once it wasn’t a direct rehash of the questions we’ve heard nine billion times. Plus, I hope he does play something funny soon-he has wonderful comic timing.

I’m kind of excited about the Star Wars rumors—I keep hearing his name tossed around by all the film journalists on twitter, as if it’s a given, but no one will “officially” announce anything until April apparently.

While he absolutely does nothing for me in the man department (all The Batch to you, ladies), these are lovely looking photos – although not very realistic ones I guess, unless they invented some kind of Time Machine. Which would be incredibly cool.

“unless they invented some kind of Time Machine”
Can you imagine?
Hello Benedict, yes we know who you are, listen trust us, in 10 years time you’re going to be a huge mega star, we’d like to take your photos now and go back to our time machine and publish them in the future? OK? Yea you’re not drunk or high, but sure, you can keep believing we are if it makes you feel better.

Either that or totally freak him out by telling him they have come back in time to 2003 to take photos of suspects who match the description of the perpetrator of the world’s most gruesome series of murders in 2013 and leave him to fret for the next 10 years wondering if/where his life goes wrong…

Yes, I could be that mean!

Then on April 1st 2014, send him a “April Fool” note from Scotland Yard!

I find this pictorial insulting. It’s so obviously airbrushed. It’s as if the magazine felt he was too unattractive to use pictures of his real face. Horrible. And I can’t understand the fans supporting this and saying how amazing he looks. It’s not his real face!

They airbrush everyone. EVERYONE. I mean, Victoria Secret models get airbrushed, would you call them unattractive? No. And just because someone airbrushes a photo of Adriana Lima it doesn’t make me think (sadly) that she’s actually not beautiful in real life.
It’s the way of the game, it’d be a shock if they didn’t do some retouching.

I see where you are coming from Abby, but I don’t think Maureen’s comments above are actually negative about Ben, but rather at the magazine for air-brushing Ben.

I understand magazines have final say on the pics published, so Ben most likely would not have had a say in if or how much the pictures were to be airbrushed. NYT is notorious for “youngifying” the stars it photographs, including models who are in their late teens/early 20′s, so if they are not good enough to be left natural, there’s no way an actor or actress with a few years on the clock is going to get away without a damn good photoshop facelift!

I prefer natural pics, but NYT is not about presenting the “every day-ness” of life.

I am just a tad disappointed that these photos cut off his beautiful hands. Surely they could have left those gorgeous long fingers in the pics. That would have been perfect.

That said, I would have to say that I have a “thing” for that hollow at the base of a man’s throat. TH has it too and it drives me wild. B&W photos seem to make it even more noticeable so as stunning as I think Ben’s face looks in these pics, my eyes keep heading down to that throat!

If they had a pic of Ben running his long fingers over that hollow in his throat, I think I would actually explode! What a way to go though!!

They always go to very thin because it is supposed to make people look young. Initially. Then,the lack of a normal amount of padding makes them age even quicker. The use of black and white adds a retro touch-like the photos from an old year book. Many actors do this to extend their careers. Hell,even Dracula looked good in the shadows- until,well,you know what sunlight did to him:)

It really depends on the magazine/photographer if someone’s photoshopped, not on the actor. Hiddleston being no exception or something special. I think it’s funny how he keeps coming up in a commentary section about Cumberbatch (and vice versa) – those two seem to haunt each other.

Having said that I have noticed that Hiddleston photographs (at least for me) very well from certain angles and with certain facial expressions and with others not so much. Because sometimes you have photos from one single photoshoot and he looks good in one picture and meh in two others – and there’s the same amout of photoshopping on all of them.

Cumberbatch is now doing all the things Hiddleston was riddled with criticism for last year (Comic Con, fashion spreads, fan baiting, uncertain future work). I wonder how long til the backlash. These two are the least deserving of criticism lol

@penny, they both already have an Olivier. Cumberbatch has TWO nominations and one win. This is Tom’s THIRD Olivier nomination and he has one win. He previously was nominated for Cymbeline and Othello (Cassio) during the same year and lost to himself. I do hope he wins; his Coriolanus was mesmerizing, but I haven’t seen Rory Kinnear’s performance and he is always so powerful.

It took me forever to catch up with why people found this guy attractive. He’s got one of the most animated faces on film. Just watched that youtube video “Benedict Cumberbatch — Fantastic Lover” and I must admit I felt some stirrings deep down in my very old soul.

I like him because he doesn’t take himself too seriously. He likes to have a joke with the rest of us but makes sure that there are boundaries. I respect him for that and for not pretending to be something he is not whilst not performing.

People have forgotten the photos from the BAFTA New York “In Conversation” Q&A he looked very young in those photos . I think the last three years of working non-stop took their toll on him physically. Even his hair was shot to hell from all the dyeing.

However he has had time to relax, take a break from work, gain some weight ( he look sooo thin when they began shooting Sherlock Series 3) and give his poor hair a break, so he does look younger instead of under-weight and fatigued.

The photos are photoshopped but they retouch everyone’s photos and he does look rather yummy.

@s – Something tells me the lack of effort into your name means you only came here to quickly troll, then bugger off again. Whilst I am fine with people coming onto these threads who are not fans and have different opinions, you’ve got to be able to back it up a bit. This is just outright stirring with no purpose other than starting a hate war.

Weird people are the spice of life! Without them everything would be bland, boring and pointless. Seriously, if everyone conformed and fit some standard I’d shoot myself. Life would be horrible. The more unusual, weird, fascinating, bizarre people I get to experience in life, the happier I’ll be.
So hell yeah to weird celebrities, in fact I wish all the other typical conventional next-door-cutsie types would just disappear. Along with the pointless gross reality porn “stars”.

That Marie Claire article starts off with a paragraph about his looks and how he deals with female attention – how sad that after four years and all the work he’s done in that time, that’s still the focus of his interviews.

I agree with Mayhem even though he has aged really well without any surgery or beauty procedures. You would of thought the interviewer would of asked him more interesting questions other than his looks.

But I agree, I find mature men more attractive. I know youth is supposed to be more appealing, but 40 year old men have always been my weak spot. They exude masculinity. The lines, the confidence and ease at being themselves, the bigger frame, all of it. Teenagers can keep the feminine pretty twenty year olds.

There’s a multitude of reasons. But personally, she’s several times appeared as not an overly pleasant person. This conversation’s been had in here before, so I don’t want to go over it again. But she’s not likeable. Certainly IMO, anyway.
As for ‘a sexy couple’? No.

This photo shoot looks very awkward.
The shoot he did with Lydia had much more chemistry and you could almost believe he was into her (which apparently he was hehe!)
It is definitely from Star Trek days – his build and his hair and even her hair is not as blonde and short as that any more.
The full shoot is available tomorrow so we will see if there is any more erm, heat….
I do not ship them at all and yeah they may have been FWB but do not see this ever being a relationship we will get to gossip about.

I saw more photo’s of him in Finland – he was with Adam – he’s always with him. I think he may and truly be single…gasp.

The only thing that dims his attractiveness (IMO) is the smoking. No need to go into invisible mode, the cigarette smell will keep me far away (and will cause me to have a massive coughing fit if I get to close.)

It’s always the same with the good ones: they’re either taken or messing with my allergies.

Benedict salsa dancing – i would love to see this!!!! HOT. One of the girls who put photo’s up said he could not salsa dance at all…ha ha. She said he was very low key but extremely friendly when approached.

Least he is enjoying his holiday in LA

I saw the rest of the Alice Eve and Benedict shoot – still not much heat and definitely from when they were filming STID in 2012/2013. He looks super hot in them!

Hahahahahaha! Posh Englishman can’t salsa dance, say it isn’t so
It’s alright, neither can I, we can learn together Benny! As soon as I win the lottery and can afford to proper stalk you around the globe as the unstable fanatic that I’m bound to become at this rate….

Agreed, the photo shoot with Alice Eve is superb! I don’t care if they’ve banged or not, those pics are delicious.

If you are on twitter, all you need to do is follow cumberwatchweb (the lady who runs the official website) or cumberbuddy – they have all the latest photos and going ons without commenting too heavily on his personal life! I do not follow any others in fear I will be forced into Cumberbatch Anonymous soon…. Once you’ve been Cumberbatched, there is no going back **side eyes**

Yeah, I think the Lydia Hearst thing is a coincidence since her shoot was a day or two before Benedict was seen there and she was just on Access Hollywood Live today (talking about her boyfriend Connolly, no less). According to that Instagram post, Benedict was hanging out with a male friend. He really seems to like San Luis Obispo. He was up there back in January too.